Iran hardliners attack Zarif over nuclear comments

Hardliners in Iran are piling pressure on the country’s main nuclear negotiator and foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, after he suggested that the US could destroy the country’s defence system “with one bomb”, leaving diplomacy as the only way to resolve the nuclear crisis.

In a meeting with students at Tehran University last week, Mr Zarif defended the interim nuclear deal reached with six major powers – the US, UK, France, Russia, China and Germany – in Geneva last month and said the Islamic regime was not capable of military confrontation with the US.

Domestic media reported on Monday that 20 hardline members of the 290-strong parliament have written to Hassan Rouhani, the centrist president, and urged him to “revise” his decision to appoint Mr Zarif as foreign minister.

Hossein Naghavi, a spokesman for parliament’s national security committee, went further and threatened to summon Iran’s foreign minister to parliament – a process which could eventually lead to impeachment.

“A foreign minister is a diplomat and should not comment on issues that are not within his authority,” Mr Naghavi said.

Kayhan newspaper, a hardline mouthpiece that has argued against the nuclear deal on the grounds that it will limit Iran’s nuclear programme to research rather than industrial capability, wrote on Monday that such comments by the foreign minister left Iran with little bargaining power in future negotiations.

Mr Zarif said at Tehran University that “western powers are not scared of a few of our tanks and missiles. They are afraid of people. Do you think the US, which can destroy all our military systems with one bomb, is scared of our military system?”

A few hours later he corrected his comments, saying that he did not intend to undermine Iran’s military capability but wanted to underline that what had deterred the US from a military invasion was the Iranian public’s support for the nuclear programme.

One senior western diplomat in Tehran said Mr Zarif’s comments may have gone too far and could provoke the wrath of the elite Revolutionary Guards.

It is not yet clear if hardliners in parliament and other power centres, including the Guards, have enough support to block Mr Zarif in nuclear negotiations.

Iran’s nuclear negotiating team has so far enjoyed the strong endorsement of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the country’s supreme leader. There is no sign that this has diminished.

Alaeddin Boroujerdi, a senior member of parliament, called on MPs to practice restraint: “While the foreign ministry is preparing the ground for the next round of talks and has a difficult job ahead, the negotiating team should be supported so that it can be strong in talks with world powers and defend national interests.”

The hardliners’ anger comes after an editorial in Aseman, a leading reformist weekly, elevated Mr Zarif to the status of hero, comparing him to Mohammad Mossadegh, the prime minister who was ousted during a US-engineered attempted coup in 1953.

In response, students at Tehran University welcomed Mr Zarif as “Mossadegh’s alter-ego”.

“In these two periods [under Mossadegh and now], the public has expected their problems to be resolved by politicians – in particular diplomats and lawyers – rather than military men,” the editorial said. “For once in our history, let’s raise our hats to a living hero inside the country, not only to an exiled dead one [Mossadegh].”